Mediating Music and Culture in Medical Rehabilitation Settings

Abstract

In this article, I highlight ways in which ethnomusicology-centered skills can be adapted for educational, practice-based, and research-based cross-disciplinary settings where topics of music and health intersect, by focusing on recurring issues that I have encountered and negotiated as an ethnomusicologist and music educator. These issues include determining the role of the ethnomusicologist in collaborative settings and developing awareness of cross-disciplinary considerations. Through discussion of project design and methodology, I explain how I have negotiated post-injury and program-based needs through practical applications of ethnomusicology to facilitate community integration through music in a community-based rehabilitation program for individuals recovering from traumatic brain injury.